Wanna be Agile? Transform your People functions

In the software industry today, there are many organizations which want to be Agile. CEOs and CTOs want to bring about Agile transformation in their traditional, waterfall organizations.

Their usual approach is to engage with a reputed Agile Consultancy which can help them bring about this transformation. A consultancy (…or ‘change agent’, if you will…) which shows them the steps they need to take, the processes they need to follow to become Agile. Indeed, Agile transformation gigs have become very lucrative business for consultancies over the last decade or so.

And yet, many such transformation gigs fail. Either the change agents are not able to bring about the changes that are needed or the organizations revert to their old habits once the consultancy’s stint is over. Occasionally, a few project teams are able to adopt Agile practices in their daily work, but the organizational transformation this gig was intended for, doesn’t materialize.

There are many reasons why this happens (…inter-organizational politics; consultancies becoming dogmatic in trying to impose Agile practices; consultancies not getting the free hand they need to influence delivery..and many more…) and each of them deserve a separate analysis of their own.

But I feel one of the big reasons is the misperception of Agile to be a “process” rather than a “mindset”.

In my career as a recruiter, I’ve spoken with many people (…across a wide spectrum of experience levels…) who claim that they’re DOING Agile…or that they want to DO Agile. I’ve spoken to people who think their organization doesn’t do Agile well enough.

This is because many people, and consequently organizations, believe that Agile is about following a set of beneficial processes and rituals in various phases of the software lifecycle.

It is assumed that if a team performs requirement gathering, estimation, design, development, testing, deployment or release in certain ways, then it is Agile. The emphasis is on learning those ways; storyboarding, iteration planning, stand-up meetings, scrums, pair programming, TDD, automation, CI, CD, fortnightly releases etc. When an organization wants to be Agile, it hires a consultancy to teach them precisely these practices.

And while these practices are essential, the truth is that projects (…and organizations…) don’t do Agile. They either ARE Agile, or they AREN’T.

Agile is not just these practices, but the mindset of the people behind these practices. And therefore, an organization can only be as Agile as its people.

Take pair programming for instance. If your developers don’t have the open mind to work together on the same piece of code; if they don’t have the open mind to give and receive feedback on their code; then they are not Agile. Even if they are following it as ‘practice’.

And if your organization has a mindset of looking at people as ‘resources’, then it will look at pair programming as a waste of ‘resource utilization’ sooner or later.

If your teams are neither transparent in communication nor receptive to feedback, then your scrums, stand-ups and retrospectives will not be meaningful. They’ll just be a ritualistic formality.

Even to do TDD, teams need to build the mindset of thinking of unit tests before they think of code. They need to build the mindset of using unit tests to drive the solution design.

Quite often, organizations tend to copy the look and feel of a typical Agile firm by setting those ‘cool’ open office spaces, revamping themselves to a flat hierarchy, or even having teams undergo Agile / Scrum certifications. But if the people (…especially leadership…) in these organizations have a hierarchical mindset, then they will never be Agile.

Everything from storyboarding to DevOps requires a mindset shift.

And that is the real challenge of Agile transformation. To learn or follow new practices might be hard, but to change your mindset is much, much harder. Transformation gigs fail because the change agent is not able to change the mindset of the organization.

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So, how can Agile transformation succeed?

In my opinion, the answer lies in the very first emphasis of the Agile manifesto; people and interactions over tools and technology.

If you want your organization to be Agile, begin by taking a hard look at your people and the way they interact.

To be Agile, you need people who are:

• open-minded and capable of changing the way they think about software engineering and delivery.
• enthusiastic to learn / adopt new practices, skills, domains and technologies with every project.
• welcoming of changing requirements, even late in development.
• transparent in communication.
• unafraid to give feedback and humble enough to receive feedback.
• collaborative team players rather than ‘individual contributors’.
• mature enough to build self organized teams.

This is where your company’s gatekeepers, i.e. the RECRUITMENT function comes into the picture. Your recruitment team needs to start evaluating candidates on the above qualities. If this means longer conversations with every candidate, then so be it. Your recruiters should neither be hesitant to have long conversations with candidates nor be afraid to reject them if they don’t meet the above criteria.

Your recruitment process must be tailored to evaluate whether a candidate is transparent, collaborative and humble. Pair with them on a problem and see how they collaborate. Give them constructive feedback and see how they take it. Indulge them in case studies / role-plays to see them in action and how they respond to change.

Screen out the “my way or the highway” candidates who refuse to change their approach even in the face of reason. They want echo chambers, not Agile teams. Screen out the “yes men” who blindly follow your approach and agree with everything you say. They will not be able to form self organized teams.

By getting the right people in, your recruitment function can be your first change agent towards Agile transformation.

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Once the people are in, your company’s guardians, i.e. the PEOPLE function comes into the picture.

The People team needs to foster an environment which facilitates open interaction between employees and makes them feel trusted. Yes, the removal of cubicles, or hierarchy, helps in this regard. But what helps the most is an informal work culture. And the People team can bring about this culture by removing unnecessary bureaucracy and red tape from the organization. Ironically, the People team is often accused of introducing bureaucracy and red tape in the first place!

One of the central principles behind the Agile manifesto is “Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done”.

Well if you are recording every employee’s in-time & out-time and admonishing them for not spending “9 hours in office”, then you’re not trusting them, are you?

Even today there are organizations which restrict free usage of internet as a policy; not because of lack of bandwidth, but because of lack of trust.

How many employees would be motivated to give and receive meaningful feedback, if the process designed by HR for doing so is cumbersome?

To be Agile, an organization needs to re-imagine their People team as enablers, not monitors. By setting the right environment, the People team can be your second change agent towards Agile transformation.

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And this is why, I appeal to the organizations that wanna be Agile:

If you have engaged an Agile consultancy to help you undergo transformation, don’t restrict them to influence only the engineering and delivery practices of your project teams. Let the consultancy also influence how you hire people and how you take care of them. Maybe get ideas from the consultancy’s recruiters and People team on how they strategize their functions. And please get your recruiters and HR directly involved in such engagements.

Because your Agile transformation will succeed only if you transform your Recruitment and People functions.